Juno News - June 30, 2025


Protests demand ＂hands off Iran＂ outside US consulate


Episode Stats


Length

9 minutes

Words per minute

153.9164

Word count

1,517

Sentence count

120

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

13

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Pro- and anti-Iranian protesters demonstrate in front of the U.S. Consulate building in Toronto. We speak to people on both sides of the conflict, and ask them why they support the Iranian regime and why they oppose it.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 This is Clayton DeMaine reporting in Toronto in front of the U.S. consulate building.
00:00:16.480 Behind me, we have the pro-Iranian regime side saying, hands off Iran.
00:00:22.360 Behind me, too, on this side, we see a lot of anti-regime Iranian folk who are praying
00:00:29.920 for an end to the Islamic diocratic dictatorship in Iran.
00:00:35.920 So we're just going to speak to some people, ask them why they're here on both sides.
00:00:41.880 Hopefully we can speak to some people who are pro-regime, although True North often has
00:00:47.360 troubles doing so, but we'll try our best.
00:00:49.720 The main problem is U.S. imperialism and it's lacking Israel.
00:00:54.580 What we really need to do is polarize these demonstrations to show a strong anti-imperialist
00:01:00.480 fight that workers here are willing to fight against Canadian and U.S. imperialism and defend
00:01:06.760 Iran.
00:01:07.760 What would you say to people who would say that the Islamic regime in Iran is an imperial
00:01:13.360 force?
00:01:14.360 Well, it's ridiculous to call a third world country an imperial force.
00:01:18.920 It is under the boot of U.S. imperialism and it has been for decades.
00:01:22.780 It's absurd to refer to it as imperialist.
00:01:25.980 They would say, you know, like funding Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis in Yemen.
00:01:31.780 That's like them exerting imperialist force.
00:01:34.780 Do you think?
00:01:35.780 Yeah, that's just ridiculous.
00:01:38.780 Do you have any opinion about those Iranians on the other side? 1.00
00:01:42.640 Yes, they're lackeys of U.S. imperialism.
00:01:44.500 They're bought and paid for by Wall Street, by the Pentagon.
00:01:48.500 They want to bring back the Shah of Iran, the puppet of the U.S. imperialists. 0.55
00:01:53.460 We defend Iran against those scumbags. 1.00
00:01:56.460 They want to keep the colonies of the global south under their heel. 0.98
00:02:00.320 And they use Islamic reaction, any kind of religious backwardness, any kind of local 0.93
00:02:06.500 bourgeois money grubber to do that job for them.
00:02:10.320 Can you just tell me what you think is the best version of socialism that's been tried?
00:02:14.320 No.
00:02:15.320 This question is too stupid to answer.
00:02:17.320 Why?
00:02:18.320 Because this is a question of which class rules society, not which country is better than that
00:02:25.940 country.
00:02:26.940 So do you think that they were never truly successful?
00:02:30.140 The so-called communist countries, the worker states that overthrew capitalism have struggled
00:02:40.280 under terrible disadvantages, under imperialist embargo and encirclement.
00:02:45.560 They have had their own problems.
00:02:47.640 But the main enemy is clearly the imperialists who want to keep all of us as slaves.
00:02:52.040 We are a woman life freedom movement, not for the invasion, not for Israel, and not for Trump
00:03:00.840 and all of these war-mongering countries.
00:03:03.840 I just thought this was an interesting one because a lot of people here are pro-regime.
00:03:09.040 People are stuck in the middle and they're forced to choose, but we don't want to choose.
00:03:20.160 So you just think the West shouldn't be involved at all?
00:03:22.160 Is that your position?
00:03:23.160 The West should not be involved in invading and bombing in another country, any country.
00:03:29.080 No.
00:03:30.080 This terrorist regime must go.
00:03:33.880 If they go, the whole world will be peace because they're supporting all the terrorists
00:03:39.420 around the world.
00:03:40.760 If the regime collapses and the Iranian people get their country back, what's the next step? 0.99
00:03:49.000 What kind of a nation would be rebuilt?
00:03:52.000 Okay, the next step is to bring our prince, our Shah, Shah's son, actually last Shah of Iran.
00:03:59.760 His son is the best alternative because he's so peaceful.
00:04:04.240 He's the best alternative.
00:04:06.240 We love him to come back to our country to bring the peace first in Iran, then the whole Middle East.
00:04:12.960 We 150% trust him with whatever he says, but the thing is that we want him 100% rule the country.
00:04:21.520 Are you from Iran as well?
00:04:22.720 Yes.
00:04:23.360 Why did you leave?
00:04:24.080 Just because of this stupid, tyrannic government.
00:04:29.280 So many young people, they just were against the government, they protest, why we don't have 1.00
00:04:36.800 enough money, why we don't have free education, everything. But they killed them. Even if they
00:04:44.400 in Twitter, if even they support Israel, they killed them. They killed them.
00:04:51.040 So why are you here, Chris?
00:04:52.160 Here? I just don't want to see escalation in the Middle East. Don't want to see war. And I think that
00:04:57.760 Canada should be coming out stronger to denounce what's happening in the Middle East and to 1.00
00:05:02.560 de-escalate tensions. Israel and America are saying that Iran had nuclear weapons.
00:05:07.440 If they did have nuclear weapons, would you still support this side?
00:05:12.160 Well, I just think the fundamental thing is that I think diplomacy wasn't significantly
00:05:18.080 tried as a route. And I'm not saying that I'm a supporter of the regime whatsoever.
00:05:21.760 But what I know that I don't support is the escalation that's happened in the region.
00:05:24.640 That's the fundamental point for me.
00:05:26.000 So we're going to wrap it up here. There's a lot of anger on this side. The anti-regime of Iran
00:05:36.800 side has left now. We're going to go ahead to, there's a party celebrating, actually,
00:05:44.320 Israel's strikes in Iran at Mel Lassman Square. So I'm going to go over there and see if we can talk
00:05:50.320 to people there and get some footage.
00:05:51.920 No justice! No peace! No justice! No peace!
00:05:56.320 Black party, shame on you! 1.00
00:05:58.320 What brings you to this event today?
00:06:00.720 Well, certainly it's standing with the community here in Toronto, the Persian community,
00:06:05.920 the Iranian-Canadian community, who has been under threat here from regime activists, from IRGC
00:06:12.720 terrorists on our soil. We want them to know that they have friends in Canadian parliament who will
00:06:18.960 stand up against the terrorists that raise money, that organize, that meet, that intimidate our own
00:06:27.520 citizens here in Canada. They have that friend in parliament in Pierre Polyev, they have that friend
00:06:32.800 in parliament in the Conservative caucus.
00:06:34.320 Absolutely. And so what are some practical things that the Conservatives are calling on the Liberal
00:06:40.880 government to do to make the community safer here and perhaps get rid of these regime activists?
00:06:49.120 Look, certainly we know that those who commit crimes should be deported, but it's been more than one
00:06:56.880 year, just over a year, that the government passed Bill C-70. We still don't have a registry for
00:07:04.560 foreign agents here. That's what we're calling the government. We're calling on the government to
00:07:08.240 make sure that they take this seriously.
00:07:09.920 You know, Iran right now is undergoing a revolution. It's a critical time. The terrorist Islamic 1.00
00:07:14.400 regime has shut down the internet. They've silenced 90 million Iranians.
00:07:18.720 The country is under severe martial law. They don't want the world to know that Iranians want 1.00
00:07:22.480 to free themselves from 46 years of Islamic dictatorship. So we are here to be their voice.
00:07:27.520 We are here to let the people know to stand on the right side of history. As you can see,
00:07:31.520 Iranians and Jews, we are more united than we've ever been because the conflict in the Middle East
00:07:36.400 is not a war between Iran and Israel. I'm Iranian and I love my Israeli brothers and sisters. This is
00:07:41.520 a war that was started by the terrorist Islamic Republic.
00:07:43.920 Okay. And what are some practical things that can the government of Canada in its various forms
00:07:50.720 can do? Is there anything that you're calling on the government here or just coming out in support?
00:07:55.520 Well, we were hoping that Mark Carney would stand on the side of the Iranian people. Unfortunately, 0.90
00:08:00.480 he went out and he encouraged diplomacy. So it's shameful that Mark Carney wants to
00:08:06.720 wants the United States to engage in diplomatic relations with a terrorist terrorist organization
00:08:11.520 that chants death to America. I think Mark Carney made a big mistake and he's going down. He stood
00:08:16.960 on the wrong side of history and we're not going to forget that. President Trump came out and he said,
00:08:20.400 make Iran great again. And I agree. I want to thank President Trump. I also want to thank Prime
00:08:24.400 Minister Netanyahu for leveling the playing field so that we Iranians can free ourselves from this brutal
00:08:30.400 Islamic dictatorship. So make Iran great again. Thanks. I'm so glad that many people showed up 1.00
00:08:35.600 today. We had a member of parliament. MP Melissa Lansman was here. Roman Weber was here. Anna Robert was
00:08:42.160 here. Kostas Menegakis was here. Many people showed up. It's time to hold IRGC accountable. It's time to
00:08:50.320 kick IRGC out of Canadian soil. So we're here at Mel Wassman Square. Certainly a different scene than
00:08:57.920 downtown by the US consulate building. There's a few hundred Israeli, Iranian and Canadian supporters of
00:09:09.760 strikes in in the Islamic regime of Iran against the Islamic regime. It's a different scene here.
00:09:17.040 There's lots of passion. You could feel the emotion of people hoping to finally free their country of
00:09:24.160 the Islamic regime in Iran. There was one protester showed up who was there at the at the US consulate
00:09:32.560 protest. I recognize him there. Everybody shouted him down calling him a terrorist.
00:09:40.640 He was holding a sign that said something about what about the Palestinian Holocaust.
00:09:45.600 There's still speeches going on, lots of energy. But this has been Clayton Demain with True North.